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Pash may have believed that he'd set himself and their little meeting up for success, but Green was experiencing completely different feelings. Since Belle and Gage had come into her life, the young woman hadn't spent much time away from either one of her children- for two specific reasons.

a) It was frustratingly difficult to find a reliable babysitter.
b) The though of leaving Belle or Gage, who were both incredibly mischievous toddlers, without her particular supervision was highly unnerving. There was no telling what the babysitter might look like when she finally returned home.

The tall, thin blonde woman stood at the front of the unbelievably long line, and was whispering very swiftly into the ear of the dark skinned toddler she held against her hip, who had a pair of skinny arms crossed over her chest and a pissed-off pout on her adorable face.

"Belle," Green hissed under her breath, mindful of the other ears around her, "They don't have any more duckies. You've got to take the moo-moo."

Belle pointedly ignored her mother's pleas and refused to take her furious eyes off of the pimple-faced teenager that was working the till. She didn't want the cow. The cow was ugly. Belle wanted the duckling, because the duckling was cute. Like her.

It made perfect sense. Why couldn't anybody else see that?

"If you don't take the damned cow," Green warned angrily, plucked the toy cow from the toddler's hand and shoved it under her daughter's nose, "We're going to go straight home and you won't be able to play on the jungle gym."

Belle, who recognized Green's tone as the one that shouldn't be messed with, sighed and wrapped her little fingers around the cow, but made a point not to look happy about it.

Mother and daughter were silent as they left the line and turned towards the tables. Green, who held Belle in one arm and a tray of fast food in the other, silently cursed Happy Meals and searched the ocean of seats for any sign of the man she was supposed to be meeting.

((woah. *can't remember the last time she came up with an RP response that long* whee

Belle's fun. ;D ))

A look of relief passed over her face when an unfamiliar man stood up and waved to her, and her lips broke out into a wide grin at the site of the fuzzy toddler he had with him. This, she knew with out even needing to ask, was the man she'd arranged to meet today.

The young, blond haired woman nodded sheepishly at him to show that she'd seen him, because her hands were too full to return the wave, and slowly made her way towards him. She danced clumsily around tables loaded with hyper active children and finally stopped in front of Pash with a sigh. A lock of hair fell in front of her eyes, and she plopped Belle down in the seat beside Owen before brushing it out of the way.

"Hello, I'm Green," she greeted the other parent smoothly, held out her hand to him and gestured at her daughter with the other, "and this is Belle."

Belle was too preoccupied with the cheaply made stuffed animal she held, which mooed delightfully every time she squeezed it, to be bothered by introducing herself to Pash or Owen.

Man, this place was noisy. The toddler glanced around the room with a look of mild disgust on her adorable features. The smell of slightly over-cooked food and other, sweaty children set her nerves on edge. The noise was interesting. The noise was fun.

Suddenly, Belle was overcome by the need to run and destroy play. If only her mother would look the other way.

The woman was hardly as pleased by the noise and the excitement as her daughter was. Green's smile was genuine, because Pash had been very wise to get them a table in the midst of all this chaos and she was grateful to him for it, but it was slightly uncertain. The place was so busy.

"I don't blame you," she chuckled softly, and side-stepped an aggressive little boy that went flying by with a basket of fries, "this place is insane. It's very lucky that we got a table. I'll watch the kids while you go."

Belle had a knack for causing trouble. Green, who couldn't always keep up with her, but tried her absolute best, had developed a bit of a talent for multi-tasking. She wasn't intimidated by the thought of keeping an eye on a pair of toddlers. Gage, her older boy, had just recently been their age. It couldn't possibly be any different than that. Could it?

The little girl had absolutely no idea about the other toddler's sensitive ears and, if she had, she probably wouldn't have cared. It was a noisy place. She was going to squeeze her cow as much as she wanted, for as long as she wanted, and she was not going to share.

When Owen stretched his hands towards her, Belle scowled at him and leaned backwards. Then, with an almost cheeky grin on her face, she tightened her grip on the cheaply made toy once more. It mooed audibly and she snickered, holding it just out of the bunny boy's reach.

"Mine," she said loudly, so that there would be no mistaking who the cow belonged to. He couldn't have it.

Green watched Pash run off with an amused smile on her face, and gladly set her own tray of food down on the table. It hadn't been very heavy, but she was relieved to finally have it out of her arms- there was far too much potential for accidents, with all of the children wandering around. It would have been very easy for any one of them to happen by and unintentionally knock it to the floor.

With a sigh, the short woman took the closest vacant seat. The children's words caught her ears, and she struggled to disguise the chuckle that escaped between her lips as a cough. Belle and Owen, though they clearly did not know it, were hilarious to watch.

Belle was enjoying her little game, and, if anybody had dared to ask, would have been more than glad to admit it. The way he stared at her and demanded that she 'play nice' caused a series of shrill giggles to fly from the very pit of her belly. As if she was going to listen to him. Mommy hadn't said anything yet, and the toddler was content on milking every little piece of amusement she could get from him.

With a wicked grin, she squeezed the little toy cow again.

Then, without a word, Green reached out and plucked it from her hands. Belle cried out in protest as she watched her mother hand the cow to Owen. How dare she!

"Mine!" Belle growled and pointed at the toy with one of her chubby fingers, while glaring pointedly at the blond woman across the table.

"If you keep that up, I'm going to give him that stupid cow to keep forever," Green's tone was crisp and to the point.

Belle was furious. She crossed her arms to show her indignation, but understood that her mother meant business. This was so unfair.

He couldn't be serious. Belle's eyebrows rose several centimeters as she struggled to comprehend exactly what he meant. Nice behavior wasn't something he could just demand from her. She had never been one to just hand something as precious and rare as that over for free. Not even her mother could make such a boast. Like everybody else, Green usually ended up paying the internationally accepted price for her kindness.

Apparently, a very crude business woman resided within the toddler's dark skin.

Belle slipped her sandals off and let them fall to the floor. She glanced at her mother, who was watching a pair of particularly energetic children propel themselves from one end of the McDonald's play structure to the other with an expression of horror on her face. Satisfied that her mother was too distracted to bother her, the little girl blinked sweetly at Owen and stretched out her little legs as far as she could beneath the table, prodding here and there with her toes in search of one of his legs.

Her intention was to pinch him. That would teach him to try and bargain with her.

"Give me my cow," she demanded haughtily, with her nose in the air.

Regardless of where it had been or what had been done to it, the cow still belonged to her. Belle watched through angry, narrowed eyes as the other toddler clutched the pathetic toy's tail between his big teeth. She couldn't believe him, nor could she understand why her idiot mother had thought it a good idea to place her newly beloved cow in the hands of this clearly deranged little boy. Who tried to eat cows?

Of course, the little girl was blissfully unaware of the contents of her Happy Meal.

"My cow!" she cried loudly and smacked Green's arm in order to get her attention. The blond woman was jerked (rather violently) out of a dreamy reverie and turned to glower at her daughter.

"Hitting isn't nice, you know."

"Sorry," Belle hissed in a tone that suggested she'd grown very sick of saying that particular word, and pointed once again at Owen, "He's biting my cow!"

This was insane. Green showed absolutely no sign of rescuing her poor, harassed toy from the unworthy (and ridiculously furry) hands of the little rabbit boy that sat across from her. Belle was swiftly running out of options and, as she had no intentions of letting her newly beloved cow plushie be eaten and insulted by a rabbit, the toddler set about preparing herself for battle.

Before her mother could even blink, the small, dark-skinned girl had stood up on her chair and launched herself across the table with a tiny war cry. Food scattered everywhere as she scrambled to reach the cow, little fists curling determinedly around it's squishy head.

"Gimme!"

"Belle!" Green cried in distress as her daughter's ankle sent a soda flying into her lap. The brown, bubbling liquid splattered all over her pale pink t-shirt and hip-hugger jeans. She was torn between cleaning up the mess and grabbing Belle away from Owen and tossing that damned cow in the garbage forever.

"Let go!" she hissed, ceased the little girl around the middle and attempted to pull her away.

The Eden child would not be moved. She clung to the cow with all of her toddler might.